Green Party politician

Berry joined the Green Party aged 28 whilst working as a medical
copywriter for large pharmaceutical companies, which she then
decided "conflicted" with her principles. She resigned, becoming
increasingly politically active and beginning a new career in an
ethical temping agency that dealt with a wide range of charitable
organisations. She was, until recently, a website manager at
Imperial College
London but quit this job in order to focus on her mayoral
campaign.

In her first major party political role as the Green Party
Campaigns Co-ordinator, Berry spearheaded the Green Energy Works
Campaign, calling for low carbon, non-nuclear energy to tackle
climate change. She also led a
campaign against the renewal of Britain's nuclear weapon, the
Trident submarine, which
saw her travel to the nuclear submarine base in Faslane, Scotland,
to protest.

Berry was one of the founding supporters of the Green Left which launched on June 4th 2006.
Berry was elected as the Green Party's Female Principal Speaker unopposed in Autumn
2006, succeeding Dr Caroline Lucas
MEP and, working alongside male Principal Speaker Dr Derek Wall, served until Autumn 2007 when Dr
Lucas resumed the post following an election. She currently writes
a regularly featured blog for the New
Statesman current affairs magazine.

On 12 March 2007, the Green Party announced that Berry would be the
party's candidate in the 2008 London mayoral election,
after she received 45% of the votes in the London Green Party's
internal election. Berry recommended that her voters back Labour Party candidate Ken Livingstone as their second preference
and Livingstone did likewise. Berry was endorsed by The Independent and The Observer newspapers, with Ken
Livingstone as second preference.. Berry came fourth, with 3.15% of
first preferences and 13.50% of second preferences. This is the
highest the Green Party has ever come in a London Mayoral election,
with her predecessor Darren Johnson
coming seventh in both the 2000 and 2004 mayoral elections.

Non-party activism

Speaking at the London mayoral
announcement

Berry was
a founder of the Alliance against Urban
4×4s, which started in Camden in 2003 and became a national
campaign demanding measures to stop 4x4s (known in the United States as sport utility
vehicles) "taking over our cities". The campaign is
notorious for its "theatrical demonstrations" and spoof parking
tickets, credited to Berry (although now adapted by numerous local
groups), some 150,000 of which have been placed on 4x4 vehicles by
campaigners. The group was successful in getting the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, to adopt
one of its founding principles when he introduced a higher congestion charge for vehicles with high
emissions. The Alliance campaigns further for greater taxes and
stricter controls on advertisements for 4x4s. An international '4x4
Network' has now been founded.

In her
local borough of Camden, Berry has also campaigned against the Iraq war, genetically modified foods and
air quality problems, and supported local services threatened by
redevelopment projects.She has advocated "green development" in
Kings
Cross Railwaylands (the largest brownfield site in the UK) to provide more
family-housing.